A collection of some of the finest verse ever written in the English language--all released to coincide with the 400th anniversary of Queen Elizabeth I's death. The Elizabethan sonneteers created haunting and magnificent poetry, as beautifully crafted as they are intensely personal. From the virtuosity of Sidney's Astrophel and Stella to the quiet solemnity of Spenser'sAmoretti, from the homoerotic muse of Barnfield to the feminine Petrarchism of Lady Mary Wroth, this extraordinary anthology reveals the astonishing possibilities of the sonnet. An introduction, notes, and chronologies of the sonnet and the poets' times provide additional illuminating context.
Maurice Evans was Emeritus Professor English, University of Exeter. His works include English Poetry in the Sixteenth Century (1955); Spenser's Anatomy of Heroism (1970); and an edition of Sidney's Arcadia (1977)